Academic Experience
Our PhD program focuses on three critical development areas to prepare you for your career:
- Independent inquiry
- Competence in research methodology
- Communication of research results
From the start, you'll be introduced to rigorous coursework and the research activities across our faculty and your PhD student peers.
Our Faculty
In our PhD degree program, you'll workk with our world-renowned faculty who are recognized for excellence in both teaching and research, and for their accessibility across degree programs.
Program Requirements
The PhD in Business Administration is a degree of the Graduate School of Duke University and follows the degree requirements set by Duke's Graduate School. In general, the PhD program requires an average of 5 years to complete. After you and a faculty member in your academic area determine your specific study program, according to your interests and goals, you'll be required to:
- Gain expertise in your area of special interest through your coursework and independent study
- Complete a preliminary qualifiying exam in this area of study by the third year of residence, or earlier
- Defend your dissertation successfully
How to Apply
If you have any questions about Fuqua's PhD programs, please contact our PhD Program Office +1 919.660.7862 or by email. Applications for the PhD program can be found online on the Duke Graduate School website. The application deadline is December 15.
Admission is based on both merit and on a competitive basis. On average, each academic area matriculates 2-3 students each year. The acceptance rate ranges between 2% and 8% across the areas.
Recent PhD Placements
| Accounting | |
| Yale University, Yale School of Management | |
| Cornell University, Johnson College of Business | |
| INSEAD | |
| University of Texas at Austin, McCombs School of Business | |
| Decision Sciences | |
| Indiana University, Kelley School of Business | |
| University of Texas at Dallas, Jindal School of Management | |
| University of Chicago, Booth School of Business | |
| European School of Management and Technology (ESMT) | |
| New York University – Shanghai | |
| Finance | |
| Yale University, Yale School of Management | |
| Purdue University, Krannert School of Management | |
| University of Michigan, Ross School of Business | |
| University of Western Ontario, Ivey School of Business | |
| City University of Hong Kong, College of Business | |
| Management and Organizations | |
| Hong Kong university of Science and Technology (HKUST) | |
| Cornell University, Johnson College of Business | |
| Tulane University, Freeman School of Business | |
| Columbia University, Columbia Business School | |
| Michigan State University, Broad College of Business | |
| INSEAD | |
| Marketing | |
| Hong Kong University, Business School | |
| University of Washington, Foster School of Business | |
| University of Rochester, Simon Business School | |
| University of Pittsburg, Katz Graduate School of Business | |
| Cornell University, Johnson College of Business | |
| Indiana University, Kelley School of Business | |
| Operations Management | |
| Georgetown University, McDonough School of Business | |
| Pennsylvania State University, Smeal College of Business | |
| University of Pittsburg, Katz Graduate School of Business | |
| University of North Carolina, Kenan-Flagler Business School | |
| John Hopkins, Carey Business School | |
| Strategy | |
| University of Minnesota, Carlson School of Management | |
| London Business School | |
| University of Colorado, Leeds School of Business | |
| Georgetown University, McDonough School of Business | |
| European School of Management and Technology (ESMT) | |
| New York University, Stern School of Business | |
Oliver Binz - Accounting
- The Information Content of Corporate Earnings: Evidence from the Securities Exchange Act of 1934
Journal of Accounting Research, 2022 - Firms’ Response to Macroeconomic Estimation Errors
Journal of Accounting and Economics, 2022 - Managerial Response to Macroeconomic Uncertainty: Implications for Firm Profitability
The Accounting Review, 2022
Gregory Burke - Accounting
- SEC Rule 14a-8 Shareholder Proposals: No-Action Requests, Determinants, and the Role of SEC Staff
Journal of Accounting and Public Policy, 2023
Matt Kubic - Accounting
- Regulator Continuity and Decision-Making Quality: Evidence from SEC Comment Letters
The Accounting Review, forthcoming - State Sponsors of Terrorism Disclosure and SEC Financial Reporting Oversight
Journal of Accounting and Economics, 2021 - Examining the Examiners: SEC Error Detection Rates and Human Capital Allocation
The Accounting Review, 2021 - Time to Get It Right: An Examination of Post-Acquisition Fair Value Adjustments
Journal of Financial Reporting, 2021
Chen Chen - Decision Sciences
- Dynamic Pricing of Relocating Resources in Large Networks
Management Science, 2021
Mingliu Chen - Decision Sciences
- Optimal Monitoring Schedule in Dynamic Contracts
Operations Research, 2020
Yan Chen - Decision Sciences
- Society of Agents: Regret Bounds of Concurrent Thompson Sampling
NeurIPS 2022, accepted
Huseyin Gurkan - Decision Sciences
- Informing the Public About a Pandemic
Management Science, 2021 - Contracting, Pricing, and Data Collection Under the AI Flywheel Effect
Management Science, 2022 - Multistage Intermediation in Display Advertising
Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, 2020
Sophie Yu - Decision Sciences
- Testing Correlation of Unlabeled Random Graphs
Annals of Applied Probability, forthcoming - Testing Network Correlation Efficiently via Counting Trees
Annals of Statistics, accepted - Settling the Sharp Reconstruction Thresholds of Random Graph Matching
IEEE Transactions on Information Theory, 2022
Jingwei Zhang - Decision Sciences
- On the Strength of Relaxations of Weakly Coupled Stochastic Dynamic Programs
Operations Research, forthcoming - Dynamic Programs with Shared Resources and Signals: Dynamic Fluid Policies and Asymptotic Optimality
Operations Research, forthcoming
Hanjing Zhu - Decision Sciences
John Barry - Finance
- Corporate Flexibility in a Time of Crisis
Journal of Financial Economics, 2022
Danbee Chon - Management & Organizations
- Disentangling the Process and Content of Self-Awareness: a Review, Critical Assessment, and Synthesis
Academy of Management Annals, 2021
Sean Fath - Management & Organizations
- Encouraging Self-Blinding in Hiring
Behavioral Science and Policy, forthcoming - How Reflecting on Experiences of Disadvantage Can Lead White Men to Perceive Racial Privilege
Harvard Business Review, forthcoming - Blinding Curiosity: Exploring Preferences for “Blinding” One’s Own Judgment
Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 2022 - Self-Views of Disadvantage and Success Impact Perceptions of Privilege Among White Men
Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 2022 - Why Putting on Blinders Can Help Us See More Clearly
MIT Sloan Management Review, 2021 - The Highs and Lows of Hierarchy in Multiteam Systems
Academy of Management Journal, 2021 - Signaling Creative Genius: How Perceived Social Connectedness Influences Judgments of Creative Potential
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 2021
Carman W Fowler - Management & Organizations
- Seen and Not Seen: How People Judge Ambiguous Behavior During the COVID-19 Pandemic
Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, 2022
Anyi Ma - Management & Organizations
- On the Mutual Constitution of Person and Culture: Examining the Link Between Perceived Control and Cultural Tightness-Looseness
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, forthcoming - Support for Increasing Low Wage Workers’ Compensation: The Role of Fixed-Growth Mindsets about Intelligence
Journal of Experimental Psychology, forthcoming - Reconciling Female Agentic Advantage and Disadvantage with the CADDIS Measure of Agency
Journal of Applied Psychology, 2022 - Exploring Perceptions of Disadvantage and Success as Interwoven Antecedents of White Privilege
Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 2022
Jessica Paek - Management & Organizations
- Congratulations, So Happy for You! Promotion Motivation Predicts Social Support for Positive Events
Motivation Science, 2022
Rebecca Ponce de Leon - Management & Organizations
- “Invisible” Discrimination: Divergent Outcomes for the Non-Prototypicality of Black Women
Academy of Management Journal, 2022 - “They’re Everywhere!”: Symbolically Threatening Groups Seem More Pervasive than Non-Threatening Groups
Psychological Science, 2022 - Double Jeopardy or Intersectional Invisibility? Reconciling (Seemingly) Opposing Perspectives
Research on Social Issues in Management: The Future of Scholarship on Race in Organizations, forthcoming - Ironic Egalitarianism: When Hierarchy-Attenuating Motives Increase Hierarchy-Enhancing Beliefs
Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 2021
Sara Wingrove - Management & Organizations
- Interpersonal Consequences of Conveying Goal Ambition
Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, forthcoming - Scientific Skepticism and Inequality: Political and Ideological Roots
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 2020
Rodrigo Dias - Marketing
- Spending and Happiness: The Role of Perceived Financial Constraints
Journal of Consumer Research, 2022 - Aha over Haha: Brands Benefit More from Being Clever than from Being Funny
Journal of Consumer Psychology, 2022
Holly Howe - Marketing
- Aha vs. Haha: Brand Benefit More from Being Clever than from Being Funny
Journal of Consumer Psychology, 2022 - Open Science Online Grocery: A Tool for Studying Choice Context and Food Choice
Journal of the Association of Consumer Research, 2022 - Being There without Being There: Gifts Compensate for Lack of In-Person Support
Psychology and Marketing, 2022 - Therapeutic Cannabis Use in Kidney Disease: A Survey of Canadian Nephrologists
Kidney Medicine, 2022 - Associations Between Resistance Training Motivation, Behaviour and Strength
International Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology, 2021 - Body Image and Voluntary Gaze Behaviors Towards Physique-Salient Images
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2021 - The Shifting Perspectives Study Protocol: Cognitive Remediation Therapy as an Adjunctive Treatment to Family Based Treatment for Adolescents with Anorexia Nervosa
Contemporary Clinical Trials, 2021 - Anger Damns the Innocent: The Paradox of Anger in False Accusations of Wrongdoing
Psychological Science, 2021
Nah Lee - Marketing
- Vertical versus Horizontal Variance in Online Reviews and Their Impact on Demand
Journal of Marketing Research, accepted
Siddharth Prusty - Marketing
- Robust Importance Weighting for Covariate Shift
Proceedings of the Twenty Third International Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Statistics, 2020
Jacqueline Rifkin - Marketing
- Penny for Your Preferences: Leveraging Self-Expression to Encourage Small Prosocial Gifts
Journal of Marketing, 2020 - How Nonconsumption Can Turn Ordinary Items into Perceived Treasures
Journal of the Association for Consumer Research, 2021 - “They’re Everywhere!”: Symbolically Threatening Groups Seem More Pervasive than Non-Threatening Groups
Psychological Science, 2022
Kelley Gullo Wight - Marketing
- Social Relationships and Consumer Behavior
APA Handbook of Consumer Psychology, 2022 - Secret Consumer Behaviors in Close Relationships
Journal of Consumer Psychology, forthcoming
Lingrui Zhou - Marketing
- Befriending the Enemy: The Effects of Observing Brand-to-Brand Praise on Consumer Evaluations and Choices
Journal of Marketing, 2022 - Aha vs. Haha: Brand Benefit More from Being Clever than from Being Funny
Journal of Consumer Psychology, 2022 - Better to Decide Together: Shared Consumer Decision Making, Power, and Relationship Satisfaction
Journal of Consumer Psychology, 2021
Yuan-Mao Kao - Operations Management
- Impact of Information Asymmetry and Limited Production Capacity on Business Interruption Insurance
Management Science, 2022
Yuexing Li - Operations Management
- Data-driven Dynamic Pricing and Ordering with Perishable Inventory in a Changing Environment
Management Science, 2022
Chen-An Lin - Operations Management
- Wait Time–Based Pricing for Queues with Customer-Chosen Service Times
Management Science, 2022
Lia Sheer - Strategy
- Sitting on the Fence: Integrating the Two Worlds of Scientific Discovery and Invention within the Firm
Research Policy, 2022 - Knowledge Spillovers and Corporate Investment in Scientific Research
American Economic Review, 2021 - Matching Patents to Compustat Firms, 1980-2015: Dynamic Reassignment, Name Changes, and Ownership Structures
Research Policy, 2021
Oliver Binz - Accounting
- FARS Midyear Meeting Outstanding Reviewer Award 2022
- EAR Conference Best Discussant Award 2021
Matthew Kubic - Accounting
- The Fuqua School of Business' Best Dissertation Award 2019-2020
Ayoub Amil - Decision Sciences
Sophie Yu - Decision Sciences
Taha Ahsin - Finance
- MFA Doctoral Symposium (2022), Finalist
- SFA Doctoral Student Paper Runners-Up Award (2022)
Jing Huang - Finance
- European Finance Association Best Conference Paper Prize 2021 for Open Banking: Credit Market Competition when Borrowers Own the Data
- Western Finance Association Best Paper in FinTech 2022, for "Fintech Expansion"
YoungJun Song - Finance
- Most Influential Faculty Award
Sean Fath - Management & Organizations
- Selected for AOM Best Paper Proceedings (top 10% of accepted papers)
Anyi Ma - Management & Organizations
- Lepage Equity, Diversity, Inclusion Faculty Award
- Alvah H. Chapman Jr. Outstanding Dissertation Award 2020
Jessica Paek - Management & Organizations
- Lim Kim San Fellowship at Singapore Management University 2022
- Kenan Institute for Ethics Graduate Fellowship 2021–2022
- Best Theoretical/Empirical Paper Award, Academy of Management Meeting, Conflict Management Division 2021
- Advanced Consortium on Cooperation, Conflict, and Complexity Graduate Student Scholarship 2021
Rebecca Ponce de Leon - Management & Organizations
- The Fuqua School of Business' Best Dissertation Award 2021-2022
- University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee Advancing Research and Creativity Grant 2022
- Winner, INFORMS/Organization Science Dissertation Proposal Competition 2021
Jessica Reif - Management & Organizations
Rodrigo Dias - Marketing
- AMA CBSig Rising Star Award (2023)
- AMA Sheth Doctoral Consortium Fellow
Jacqueline Rifkin - Marketing
- Co-Principal Investigator, The Jerome A. Chazen Institute for Global Business Research Grant 2022
- Best Talk Award 2022, Society for Consumer Psychology Conference (Interpersonal Relations & Group Processes Track)
- Early Career Faculty Award 2021, University of Missouri-Kansas City Emeritus College
Holly Howe - Marketing
- AMA Sheth Consortium Fellow 2020
- Society of Consumer Psychology, Best Poster Award - Beyond Persuasion: Developing a Framework of Communication Patterns in Joint Decision-Making
Chenghuai Li - Operations Management
- Winner, Best Paper Competition 2022, Digital Supply Chain and Supplier Diversity Conference
Yuexing Li - Operations Management
Chen-An Lin - Operations Management
Lia Sheer - Strategy
- The Fuqua School of Business' Best Dissertation Award 2020-2021
What areas of study do you offer?
We have study concentrations in the following areas: Accounting, Decision Sciences, Finance, Marketing, Management and Organizations, Operations Management and Strategy.
Could you evaluate my chances of admissions to the program?
Please be advised, we cannot offer assessment of candidacy to applicants or provide feedback to re-applicants. The admission decision is made by faculty in each area and awarded on a competitive basis, after evaluating all applications. We encourage all interested candidates to apply.
Do you have online or part time options for your degree program?
No, online or part time options are not available for our doctoral program.
Do you have to be in residence during the program?
Students are required to be in residence during their coursework (2-3 years) and are highly encouraged to remain in residence for the remainder of the program. On average, students complete the program in 5 years.
I have a graduate degree. Could I be exempt from the GRE/GMAT test requirement?
The GMAT or GRE is required for admission to the Business Administration Program. The GMAT or GRE cannot be waived under any circumstance.
Is there a minimum score for GMAT or GRE?
There is no minimum score requirement, although successful applicants tend to have competitive scores.
If I have an MBA degree, will that make a difference?
Some students have an MBA or another master's degree before entering the program. However, an MBA or another master's degree is not required for admissions.
Is work experience required?
No, it is not required.
Are interviews required as part of the admissions process?
No, they are not required, although some areas may choose to conduct preliminary interviews prior to final admission decisions.
How many recommendation letters are required?
Three recommendation letters are required.
What financial assistance is available for doctoral students?
Fuqua offers fellowships to all doctoral students, including international students. This fellowship pays for tuition, a competitive stipend for living expenses, and single person health fees. The fellowship is renewable for up to five years of doctoral education, conditional on good academic standing in the program. Additional funding in the form of research and teaching assistantships is also available to PhD students. For information about financial aid, please see https://gradschool.duke.edu/financial-support.
Your admission to the PhD program will include stipends, tuition and registration, and health fees for up to ten semesters, provided you are making satisfactory progress in the program. Other forms of financial assistance include:
- Desktop computer
- Support for approved academic travel
- Assistance in seeking funding from the Graduate School and outside sources
Teaching and research assistantships are available for supplementary funding. For additional information about financial aid, please see https://gradschool.duke.edu/financial-support.
Can I visit the Fuqua School of Business?
The PhD office is unable to offer school tours or individual meetings with Fuqua faculty before the pre-admit season begins. Contacting faculty prior to application submission is not necessary. Due to the volume of inquiries, faculty members regret that they are unable to respond to all inquiries. Prospective students are encouraged to learn about faculty research.
Do you have a resource guide for Duke and the greater Durham area?
Duke Graduate School and the Emerging Leaders Institute have surveyed current students and created The Professional's Guide to Duke and Durham to answer common questions for incoming students.
Duke's Graduate School
The answers to the following frequently asked questions can be found at the Duke's Graduate School general webpage:
- How do I apply to the PhD Program?
- Do I need to provide TOEFLs or IELTS scores?
- What is the minimum ESL-related score?
- If I have an admissions question, who do I contact?
- How much is the application fee?
- Are official documents required during the application review process?
- My transcript is not in English, do I need to provide a translation?
- What if I retake the GRE or GMAT, which score is considered?
- How can I check the status of my application?
